The type of preloaded electrical connector shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,760,335 issued Sep. 18, 1973 to L. E. Roberts typifies a form of connector having multiple contacts arrayed in rows in plug and receptacle connector halves and adapted to be terminated to the different wires of a multi-wire electrical cable. Such connectors are widely used in telephone and data interconnection systems and are frequently assembled onto cable wires with automatic or semi-automatic tooling. U.S. Pat. application Ser. No. 329,470 filed Mar. 28, 1989 in the name of Joseph Michael Bowling and Matthew Taylor Miller shows a method of making a cable assembly utilizing connectors of the type shown in the aforementioned issued patent. With respect to such method and the apparatus related thereto, an important step relates to testing the connector to make sure that termination has been in fact made and continuity between terminal and wire is present. Past practice in this regard has involved probing each contact following termination; probing the several contacts following termination of all wires related to the connector through the use of a specially prepared mating connector half plug or receptacle after a cable has been fabricated, or in certain cases and in the case of the aforementioned method, testing the connector for continuity as the cable termination process proceeds using specially prepared plug and receptacle mating connector halves. All of these practices require labor and time, either through the need to probe or through the need to change connector half, plug, or receptacle in accordance with the connector half being tested; this latter requirement interrupting the otherwise automatic machine cycle repeatedly as the plug and receptacle halves of a cable harness are terminated and tested.
The type of multi-contact connectors disclosed in the aforementioned patent and application have a common feature with respect to many other types of connectors in that the housings thereof are arranged in plug and receptacle or male and female forms with the contacts in each of the different halves positioned to mate along a common axis extending in a plane or planes defined by the rows of contacts in both different halves of the connector. The contacts or the connectors are typically surrounded by plastic of the connector housings on one side or the other, depending upon whether the contact is associated with a plug or a receptacle. These constructions make it difficult to probe the contacts, except with an appropriately opposite mating connector half.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a contact system useful in mating with the contacts of plug and receptacle connectors despite the differences in geometry and location of the terminals within such different connector halves. It is a further object to provide a contact system useful with both plug and receptacle halves of a connector to save labor and reduce the cost of changeover during testing or other mating operations wherein both plug and receptacle halves must be interconnected.
It is a final object of the invention to overcome the shortcomings heretofore mentioned in the background of the invention particularly with respect to the provision of a test fixture utilizing the contact system of the invention.